1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a dice recognition system using computer vision technology, and more particularly, to a dice recognition system that recognizes the number of dot on a dice using multiple image capturing devices in an uncontrolled environment.
2. Description of Related Art
Common dice games are played on game tables, where the banker rolls the dice and multiple players place their bets before the banker reveal the dice's outcomes. This interaction between the players and the banker has been taken place in an open and uncontrolled environment for decades and will keep the same in the future.
In recent years, computer-controlled automatic dice game systems are emerging to the market. The system is composed of various hardware components and a dice recognition software, which work together to roll the dice, open the dice cup and recognize the outcomes automatically. The core part of this technology is the dice recognition software that implements computer vision algorithms to identify the number of dot on each dice from images captured by a monocular camera.
Open-table dice games are much more popular than automatic dice game systems because most players are more familiar and comfortable with open-table games than computer-controlled closed systems. It would be advantageous if automatic recognition of dice can perform on regular game tables. For example, virtual bankers can be made to replace human bankers for offering the services at each game table. Or the automatic dice recognition can help human bankers double-check the computer recognizing number, count and collect won and loss wagers, and minimize possible mistakes and frauds. Various automatic open-table games can also be designed.
All existing automatic dice recognition systems are closed systems. The recognition software can only work for that specific closed system, and cannot be applied to common open table games. The major cause of this limitation is that the algorithm in the recognition software is designed for the dot images taken from the top view, under predefined illumination conditions, in that specific closed environment. None of these parameters and their ranges remains the same in open table games, and the algorithm does not work for different ranges of the parameters.
In order to design a system for the recognition of dice in uncontrolled open table games, the present invention proposes a system to integrate the appearances of the dice captured by cameras of different viewpoints, and characterize the coplanar features on the dice. The proposed system exploits color components, artificial neural networks, and stereo vision technology to come up with an algorithm robust to illumination variations, and thus applicable to uncontrolled open environments.